Alan Gregory series ends in “Compound Fracture”

Stephen White grins ruefully when he thinks back to “Privileged Information,” the 1991 mystery that spawned a 20-book series about clinical psychologist and avocational detective Alan Gregory.

“I didn’t have a plan,” he said.
“If I’d intended to be writing a series, then I made a series of awful decisions. Starting with a protagonist who’s a small-town psychologist who had no way to get involved in a criminal investigation.”

But, for countless fans who are sorry that Alan Gregory’s literary career ends with White’s latest book, “Compound Fractures,” part of the charm is in seeing how the cerebral Alan Gregory extracts himself from dangerous and improbable situations.
As the series progressed, those situations got more plausible, thanks to the police officers and other legal professionals White enlisted as fact-checkers and draft readers.
“I am so grateful to them for giving me guidance,” he said.
“And I’m glad that when I began the series, I was still young enough to know what I didn’t know. People were so overwhelmingly gracious.”

Closing the final chapter on Alan Gregory’s life is something he’s still sorting out.
Soft-spoken, with a lean body that’s all angles, White speaks fondly of the slightly prickly character he’s created. He is pleased that, throughout all 20 novels, he’s sidestepped the details of Alan Gregory’s appearance.

Readers know only that Alan Gregory is tall, White observed, but it’s up to their imaginations to color in his hair and eye color. When White decided to have Alan Gregory get married, he left a literary ellipses between the engagement and the newlyweds.
“I set the wedding between the books in the series, because I didn’t want to imagine the wedding,” White said.
“I got a lot of questions from readers about that. I’m very happy to let them fill in the blanks for themselves. I want people to experience Alan with more questions than answers.”

So that’s why, in the epilogue of “Compound Fractures,” White is ambiguous about the mysterious, sultry woman waiting in Alan Gregory’s bedroom. Let them guess, he says. Let them wonder why another character is allowed to close the chapter by telling Alan Gregory, “Whoever it is in there, I figure you chose the wrong woman.”
White’s ambiguity is reflected in his own internal response to the end of the series.
“Friends ask me if this is bittersweet, but no, I’ve not felt that,” he says.
“I’ve felt an unyielding sense of gratitude. I think back to that first book, and when it was published. I was floating for days. Very few writers get to end a series on their own terms. I have a publisher who supports me in this, and an editor who supports me, and I feel blessed beyond all bounds.”